The Malik Report

The Red Wings made their annual pre-holiday visit to Children's Hospital today, and DetroitRedWings.com's Andrea Nelson penned an article about the team's trip:

[Coach Mike] Babcock and the Red Wings make their annual visit to the hospital to bring holiday cheer to the children and families, but often leave with smiles on their faces as big and genuine as the ones they inspire.

“It’s like when you give presents to somebody on Christmas or on their birthday, their whole face, their whole heart lights up and just for them to see us, it’s like that same reaction so it’s unbelievable actually,” [Brendan] Smith said. “It’s quite an experience and I love how we set it up like this. It’s pretty impressive.”

The organization’s support of Children’s Hospital of Michigan over the years is greatly appreciated by everyone at the Detroit Medical Center.

“I can tell you that there is no team, no community organization, no group of human beings that have been more supportive, more kind to the children of this hospital than the Ilitch family and the Detroit Red Wings,” said Herman Gray, president of Children’s Hospital of Michigan. “And we are really grateful for it. You have stood up when things were going great, you have stood up when things were going not quite as great but you’ve always been there for us.”

“This deal I feel is completely revolting,” said Jerry Belanger, owner of the Park Bar, a downtown building that also houses Cliff Bell’s jazz club. “There is no economic benefit to Detroit.”

The council will hold a special session on Dec. 17 to continue discussions on the proposal. It’s unclear if the panel will vote at the December meeting. The expansion is needed for state-approved tax revenue for the project, which includes bonds for construction. Since the tax dollars are not part of the city’s general revenue fund, they are not affected by the city’s bankruptcy filing.

Funds from the Downtown Development Authority, an entity separate from the city of Detroit, can only be used for economic development within its boundaries. The new district spans from around Grand Circus Park to Charlotte between Woodward and Grand River avenues.

Resident Dawn DeRose told the council there are too many unanswered questions.

“It should be made more public. A lot of people don’t know what’s happening,” she said. “I think that Detroit is being taken advantage of.”

I cannot deny that it feels more than a little "weird" to be a Red Wings fan knowing that the great Daniel Alfredsson Returns to Ottawa Game is imminent. With the Canadian media maelstrom already beginning to simmer and boil, the Most Important Game On The NHL Schedule Ever Thus Far Anyway's already casting a long shadow.

Grantland's Sean McIndoe delves into the psychological aspect of the imminent reunion affair by pondering how Senators fans should react to Alfredsson's return to the team from which he divorced himself this past July, and something tells me that "Option 5" will win out:

Option 5: We are not sure how we feel right now (i.e., the Mats Sundin)

The backstory: By 2008, Sundin had spent 13 seasons in Toronto and made a strong case for himself as the best player in franchise history. But the Leafs were drifting badly in the salary-cap era, and when general manager John Ferguson Jr. was fired in February, it was clear that the team planned to hold a fire sale at the trade deadline.

Updated 14x at 5:19 PM: Okay, so the Red Wings will be without Pavel Datsyuk when they play against the Boston Bruins on Wednesday as the NHL is on the "Rob Ford Plan" when it comes to supplemental discipline (i.e. they're on crack).

Detroit Red Wings forward Pavel Datsyuk will miss a second straight game as a result of experiencing concussion symptoms.

General manager Ken Holland told the Free Press that Datsyuk will not play Wednesday, when the Wings host the Boston Bruins (7:30 p.m., FSD, NBCSN). Datsyuk didn't practice today but did ride a stationary bike.

Datsyuk has been held out since being hit in the head by Ottawa's Jared Cowen on Saturday. Datsyuk remains day-to-day. The Wings are treating Datsyuk as if he has a concussion and "until he is symptom-free for a few days, he won't play," Holland said.

Forward Todd Bertuzzi will also miss Wednesday's game because of an upper-body injury.

Red Wings coach Mike Babcock received an honorary doctorate in law at McGill University's Fall Convocation on Monday, and as you might expect, the McGIll Reporter's Neale McDevitt reports that Babcock delivered a...Babcockian message:

Over three years of my undergrad [in Education at McGill] I had a professor who cared for me. I visited him regularly. He was a great man.” Babcock told the audience that filled Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier, as he accepted his honorary Doctor of Laws. “When I went to his office to get my final grade he said to me ‘Mike I’m going to give you the highest grade I’ve ever assigned. That means you’ve got potential but… potential is a dirty word unless you do something with it.’

“Life for me is about squeezing every ounce out of yourself, out of your potential. It’s a journey. It takes time,” said the Detroit Red Wings’ head coach “When you embrace what McGill stands for, when you embrace lifelong learning there’s lots of room for growth.

Babcock received his Doctor of Law, honoris causa in the afternoon Convocation ceremony. Calgary philanthropists and McGill benefactors Richard A. Walls and Carolina J. Walls each received a degree of Doctor of Science, honoris causa at the morning ceremony.

The Wings will get back to work today, preparing to spend Thanksgiving Evening battling a Boston Bruins team that surrendered a literal last-second game-tying goal against the Pittsburgh Penguins but took a 4-3 OT decision on Monday.

The Wings will also make their annual pre-Christmas trip to Children's Hospital today, and after Wedneday night's game and an "American Thanksgiving" spent in Metro Detroit, the Wings will play a Black Friday matinee on Long Island (4 PM EST start), and they'll then head into the media maelstrom ahead of Daniel Alfredsson's return-to-Ottawa game on Sunday.

As the Ilitches have amassed land behind the Fox Theatre and are now gobbling up mostly empty lots southeast of the Masonic Temple, Michigan sports fans have been asking a question for a good twenty years now: "I wonder what they're going to build here, and I wonder how much all of this stuff cost them?"

We know the former answer--the Wings' follow-on rink will stand north of I-75 near Woodward Avenue and Temple Street, but the heart of the Cass Corridor and the vast tract of empty properties behind the Fox Theatre will be developed as part of the bargain, and this morning, the Detroit News's Louis Aguilar reports that there's a tally for the real estate:

Owners of the Detroit Red Wings have paid at least $48 million in land deals and own nearly half of the 45-block area where the Wings’ new home ice and an entertainment district are planned, according to a city document.

It’s the first time a price has been revealed in the years-long acquisition of property by Olympia Development of Michigan (ODM) for a project that could reap huge financial rewards. It’s also the first time Olympia has divulged how much land it has bought; many land deals in the area have been shrouded in mystery, their buyers in question.

The Russians tend not to send their best Major Junior prospects across the pond for the CHL's Subway Super Series, and as such, it's something of a toss-up as to whether the six-game battle between the Russian major-junior-aged representatives and a trio of QMJHL, OHL and WHL All-Star teams are competitive or whether they're something of a rout.

This year's a little different. Red Wings prospect Anthony Mantha scored goals in the QMJHL's 3-2 and 4-3 wins over Russia, but what is supposedly a very middling Russian lineup has turned the tables on the Ontario Hockey League, first taking a 5-2 decision over the OHL team that included Zach Nastasiuk last Thursday.

On Monday, Red Wings prospect and prospective Canadian World Junior Team starting goalie Jake Paterson stopped 21 of 23 shots but was bested by his Russian goaltending competitor, Ivan Nalimov. Nalimov stopped 50 of 52 shots in regulation and OT and stopped 7 shootout shooters to Paterson's 6 of 8 as the Russians won 3-2 in a shootout.

Former Canadiens coach Scotty Bowman earns the Biggest Brain title after winning nine Stanley Cups as a coach with three different teams. No other NHL coach has won more than two.

Wayne Fish of The Hockey News asked Pierre McGuire, who was an assistant under Bowman with the Pittsburgh Penguins when they won the Stanley Cup in 1992 and is now an analyst with NBC, what he learned from Bowman.

About The Malik Report

The Malik Report is a destination for all things Red Wings-related. I offer biased, perhaps unprofessional-at-times and verbose coverage of my favorite team, their prospects and developmental affiliates. I've joined the Kukla's Korner family with five years of blogging under my belt, and I hope you'll find almost everything you need to follow your Red Wings at a place where all opinions are created equal and we're all friends, talking about hockey and the team we love to follow.